MIT Koch Institute

colorful microscopic image with blue, red, pink, and white splotches - inflammation jolts “sleeping” cancer cells awake, enabling them to multiply again.

How do dormant cancer cells turn dangerous? Weinberg lab research in PNAS shows inflammation sparks reactivation, while M2 macrophages and EGFR ligands accelerate growth. Cells then develop an “awakening memory,” staying active without cues: news.mit.edu/2025/inflamm...

Chemotherapy drugs carried by a bottlebrush polymer (“Bottlebrush” particles deliver big chemotherapy payloads directly to cancer cells)

Jeremiah Johnson gives chemotherapy a “bottlebrush” boost: antibody-targeted polymer particles carry hundreds of drug molecules directly to cancer cells, wiping out most tumors in mice.
news.mit.edu/2025/bottleb...

🚨 Attention undergraduate scientists and engineers! 🚨 Want to spend a summer doing research at MIT? Join us for the 2026 MIT Summer Research Program!
Learn more and apply: oge.mit.edu/msrp/
@mitdeptofbe.bsky.social @mitcheme.bsky.social @mitkochinstitute.bsky.social

a man standing in front of a podium giving a speech

a man stands in front of a powerpoint slide giving a talk, surrounded by audience members on either side of him

Two men standing in front of a podium having a discussion

Thank you to Dr. David Mutch of Washington University in St. Louis for delivering the Judith Ann Lippard Memorial Lecture. His insightful talk highlighted how far we’ve come—& how far we’ve yet to go—in understanding & treating endometrial cancer. ki.mit.edu/events/prize...

close-up of female astronaut's face.

Cima Lab alum Canan Dagdeviren’s breast-cancer–detecting bra launched into space aboard Blue Origin’s all-female crew. In microgravity, tumor growth accelerates—helping fast-track innovations in early detection back on Earth. news.mit.edu/2025/breast-...

A cute intestine smiles while surrounded by foods like cheese, meat, and nuts.

A new @nature.com study from the Yilmaz lab suggests cysteine-rich diets may help the gut heal by activating an immune pathway that enables stem cells to regrow intestinal tissue—offering insights for repairing damage from radiation or chemo.

buff.ly/7XvSd11

two men posing for the camera

group of seven people posing for the camera

three men posing for the camera

Thanks to all who attended the 2025 Angelika Amon Young Scientist Award ceremony. The award honors exceptional graduate work done outside the US & brings winners to the KI to share their science. Congrats to Sourav Ghosh & Kotaro Tomuro on engaging talks. mit-ki.org/46zzJB5

Great to see this story in print! Congrats @megtriesscience.bsky.social @douglaspdyer.bsky.social and team! Looking forward to sharing Megan's first contributions as a postdoc in our lab at @mitdeptofbe.bsky.social @mitcheme.bsky.social @mitkochinstitute.bsky.social soon... 👀

A human natural killer cell (Engineered “natural killer” cells could help fight cancer)

The Chen Lab has identified a one-step way to engineer CAR NK-cells that are more effective, less likely to be rejected, and faster to manufacture — a path toward off-the-shelf cancer immunotherapies given at diagnosis, weeks sooner than current options. 🧪 news.mit.edu/2025/enginee...

From eerie cells to ghostly glows, our researchers are serving frightfully good science this Halloween! These spooky selections from the #KIImages collection prove that science can be drop-dead gorgeous: ki-images.mit.edu

Side by side headshots of Sourav Ghosh and Kotaro Tomuro, winners of the 2025 Angelika Amon Young Scientist Award

Join us on Nov. 6th at 10 a.m. as our 2025 Amon Young Scientist Award winners Sourav Ghosh (@souravsgw.bsky.social) of IIT Bombay & Kotaro Tomuro of RIKEN & UTokyo_News_en share their work! MIT community & Amon Lab alumni welcome. buff.ly/nzhbwPp

A fiery red circle with a black hold in the center, Looks like the lord of the rings eye of sauron

Embark on a journey of discovery!
Catch October’s Cancer Solutions email newsletter & subscribe to follow the quest for groundbreaking cancer research.

Read: mailchi.mp/mit/cancer-s...
Subscribe: ki.mit.edu/news/newslet...

@erikmcintire.bsky.social Following up to see if the MIT Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research could be added to the science feed?

Drs. Fuguo Liu and Jianzhu Chen at the @mitkochinstitute.bsky.social have made a new way to engineer CAR-NK cells that makes them much less likely to be rejected by the patient’s #ImmuneSystem.

Learn how this aids the development of “off-the-shelf” CAR-NK cells: https://bit.ly/3KIOPf9

Black poster with pink flowers and the text 2026 Image Awards Call for Submissions Deadline Friday, October 10, 2025. The text Koch Center for Integrative Research appears in a small font in the upper left hand corner.

Deadline extended! MIT students, faculty & staff—there's still time to submit your most biomedical images for the 2026 Image Awards Competition - winners will be included in our #KIimages exhibition. The deadline is now October 14th. Details + entry form: ki.mit.edu/imageawards

A circular inset shows small materials in body and blood stream in different shapes, including colorful zigzag lines for DNA barcode, and blues squiggles for nanoparticles. In the background are examples of test strips, some with dark and some with light lines on the strip.

Celebrating National Nano Day with nanoscale innovation—the Bhatia Lab’s sensors combine precision and speed to detect cancer biomarkers early. news.mit.edu/2023/simple-...

One woman wearing a sweater and two men wearing white lab coats working in a lab. Paula Hammond, Ivan Pires, Ezra Gordon in a lab.

From lab to large scale—on National Nano Day, we celebrate the Hammond Lab’s nanoparticle manufacturing platform, making advanced therapeutics more accessible.

news.mit.edu/2025/enginee...

Tweezers pluck a piece from an RNA strand, with organ icons around it. (How AI could speed the development of RNA vaccines and other RNA therapies)

Happy National Nano Day! In Giovanni Traverso’s Lab, innovation happens at the nanoscale. The Composite Material Transformer is redefining precision in lipid nanoparticle design. See how this tool is shaping the future of nanomedicine: www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQpm...

Dietary cysteine enhances intestinal stemness via CD8+ T cell-derived IL-22 - Nature Dietary cysteine enhances intestinal stem cell-mediated intestinal repair following injury by promoting CD8 T cell-regenerative immune responses.

#NatMetabPicks | In @nature.com led by O Yilmaz ( @mitkochinstitute.bsky.social )

Coupled cysteine metabolism between intestinal stem cells and mucosal CD8αβ+ T cells increases intestinal stemness.

🧪

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The film will also be available to stream on the PBS app and PBS YouTube.

Blue poster with a black and white photo of Phil Sharp working in the laboratory with the text: Cracking the Code: Phil Sharp and the Biotech Revolution and the logos for Independent Lens and PBS.

Discover the story behind the biotech industry and the man at the center of changing it forever: Phil Sharp.

Watch Cracking the Code: Phil Sharp and the Biotech Revolution’ on PBS Independent Lens starting October 6.  Check your local listings here: pbs.org/tv_schedules/

Photo of Sanghyun Park against blue and purple background with the text Vote for Me! Massaschusetts Institute of Technology - SLIM - Collegiate Inventors Competition.

We’re cheering on Traverso Lab PhD student Sanghyun Park — 2024 #KIimages Award winner & finalist in the National Inventors Hall of Fame 2025 Collegiate Inventors Competition! Join us — vote daily through 10/15, 5pm ET: www.invent.org/collegiate-i...

Black poster with pink flowers and the text 2026 Image Awards Call for Submissions Deadline Friday, October 10, 2025. The text Koch Center for Integrative Research appears in a small font in the upper left hand corner.

Could your research be a work of art? MIT students, faculty & staff—submit your most vibrant biomedical images for the 2026 Image Awards Competition — winners will be included in our #KIimages exhibition. The deadline is October 10th. Details + entry form: ki.mit.edu/imageawards

Side by side headshots of Sourav Ghosh and Kotaro Tomuro, winners of the 2025 Angelika Amon Young Scientist Award

Join us on Nov. 6th at 10 a.m. as our 2025 Amon Young Scientist Award winners Sourav Ghosh (@souravsgw.bsky.social) of IIT Bombay & Kotaro Tomuro of RIKEN & UTokyo_News_en share their work! MIT community & Amon Lab alumni welcome. buff.ly/nzhbwPp

Hi Erik! Could the MIT Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research be added to the science feed? We support cross-disciplinary research that advances detection, monitoring, and treatment of cancer. We'd love to share research publications, invitations to symposia, and job postings.

ki.mit.edu

The video 🎥 of the #BeilsteinTalk “Next-generation drug and vaccine delivery for global health” with Ana Jaklenec from the MIT @mitkochinstitute.bsky.social, is NOW available 🔓 in the video portal of the TIB Hannover:
🔗 https://av.tib.eu/media/71586
#DrugDelivery #GlobalHealth #BeilsteinTalks

Blue background with yellow and green depiction of molecules and helix strands and the text Decoding Gene-iuses September 21st from 12 - 4pm.

Join us on Sunday, Sept. 21st at the Cambridge Science Carnival! Stop by our booth, for Decoding Gene-ius, to uncover DNA secrets & explore how genes guide medicine. Full schedule of free events at cambridgesciencecarnival.org #CSC2025

Black poster with pink flowers and the text 2026 Image Awards Call for Submissions Deadline Friday, October 10, 2025. The text Koch Center for Integrative Research appears in a small font in the upper left hand corner.

Frame your science in a new light! MIT students, faculty & staff—submit your most striking biomedical visuals for the 2026 Image Awards Competition - winners will be included in our #KIimages exhibition. The deadline is October 10th. Details + entry form: ki.mit.edu/imageawards

Pretzel-shaped silicone tube next to a quarter for size comparison

Congrats to @MichaelJCima on FDA approval of INLEXZO™, a pretzel-shaped intravesical device for bladder cancer. First developed in the Cima Lab,
it delivers chemo “low and slow,” improving outcomes for patients whose cancers resist standard treatments. buff.ly/Dce91KC

Aerial view of the Charles River, Longfellow Bridge, Boston, and Cambridge.

MIT and danafarber.bsky.social researchers: The Bridge Project is now accepting proposals for translational cancer research projects.

Proposals are due by 10:00AM EDT Tuesday October 14, 2025. For more details: ki.mit.edu/bridge-RFA